The present invention relates broadly to an apparatus that can be adapted and added to a hang glider, or ultralight air vehicle, to provide rapid deployment of a parachute should such an emergency arise; and thus provide additional safety to the operator of the hang glider (or ultralight air vehicle).
The present apparatus was developed for use on either a hang glider, or ultralight air vehicle, or any such air vehicle that needs a parachute deployed rapidly.
According to the June 1981 issue of "Glider Rider", there were 51 fatalities reported in 1980 resulting from the accidents during use of hang gliders. Such fatalities are often caused by an inexperienced pilot, but even an experienced pilot may fail to properly strap himself into the hang glider, collide with another hang glider, develop a low altitude stall, etc. and not be able to correct the situation and ultimately crash. Fatal crashes have been associated with hang gliders and ultralight air vehicles since they were first developed.
In 1977 a few manufacturers associated with hang gliding began manufacturing and distributing a new low weight manually thrown parachute that was part of the pilot's harness. These parachutes were designed to be manually thrown entirely clear of the glider by the pilot. Once clear of the glider, such a parachute would then fully inflate; this of course assumes that the pilot would and could take his hands off the controls long enough to throw the parachute, that the pilot could throw the chute clear of the air vehicle and that the situation would be such that there would be sufficient time to enable the parachute to fully inflate and sufficiently slow down the falling glider before crashing into the ground. In a vast majority of hang glider and ultralight accidents, a manually thrown parachute system is generally not an effective solution to the emergency for various reasons. It is thought that in many cases when the pilot would effectively throw the chute away from the glider, but the lines of the chute would become entangled in the glider because the pilot could not throw the chute with enough force for the chute to sufficiently clear the air vehicle, and consequently the chute would become entangled with the glider and not inflate.
Another reason why a manually thrown parachute is not an adequate solution is that in an emergency situation, it would not be unusual for the glider to fall at a speed of 60 mph, or 88 feet per second, toward the ground. To so fall from an altitude of 400 feet, at a rate of 88 feet per second, allows for only five seconds to pull, throw and fully inflate a parachute that is part of the pilot's harness. That is not enough time! The minimum altitude for reasonable deployment chances of a conventionally thrown parachute is thought to be approximately 500 feet. Since a high proportion of hang glider problems begin below 500 feet and even below 300 feet, a manually thrown chute is generally inadequate since such would not have sufficient time to open and safely act on the hang glider.
The present invention provides a dual system, a redundant system, for ballistic deployment of a parachute with the use of an explosive charge to propel the packed parachute away from the structure of the hang glider (or ultralight) and cause the parachute to clear the air vehicle and fully inflate within two seconds and provide the operator with a relatively safe descent toward the ground. A single explosive charge can be activiated, or exploded, electrically by manually pulling on a handle, or alternatively, the same charge can be activated by manually pulling on a second handle that acts as a mechanical trigger mechanism to fire the charge. Thus the ballistic recovery system of the present invention can be operated with only the mechanically activated system, or alternatively with the electrically activated system, and the redundancy of the two different separate activation systems provides much greater safety for the operator.
In the present invention, the parachute deployment package, or the "packed" parachute, is generally secured to the landing gear of the air vehicle, although it may be attached differently to alternative frame portions for different aircrafts. When the system is activated and the charge is exploded in an emergency situation, a projectile attached to the top of the parachute will be shot away from the glider pulling parachute out of its package or container. To activate the system, the pilot simply pulls a first handle that triggers a mechanical firing mechanism to explode a small powder charge; or, alternatively, the pilot pulls a second alternative handle that closes an electrical contact which activates an electrical charge to ignite the small powder charge. By either activation, the small powder charge blows the projectile and the parachute away from the air vehicle at approximately 300 feet per second, extending and opening the parachute behind the air vehicle. As a result of the fully deployed and inflated parachute, the pilot secured to the air vehicle is brought down to a relatively safe landing. This system deploys a parachute with sufficient speed and in minimal elapse time to enable full inflation of the chute at altituudes below 100 feet. In comparison, the system of manually throwing a chute from the air vehicle has a minimal operating altitude of approximately 500 feet. The safety advantages of the present system should be readily apparent.